Often, people are jokingly described as 'clean freaks' or similar by their nearest and dearest but for some, living with crippling Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is no laughing matter.

One such person, is mother-of-three Hayley Leitch who lived her whole life with OCD which was so debilitating it caused her to have constant thoughts that her family would be harmed if she did not carry out her cleaning rituals, which would see her scrubbing for hours on end and constantly rinsing her bare hands in bleach.

For years her family did not realise Hayley, 29, from Grinstead, was suffering from the condition but her husband Robin began to gt an inkling when she demanded he wash the cat.

She asked him to put his mother's pet in the bath when she saw her children were stroking it. He did and it scratched his
arm to pieces.

He then realised she was ill but even that didn't make Hayley seek help.

The condition started when she was just a young child. Nobody knew what it was and none of her three sisters suffered such behaviours.

She was just four when her beloved Nanny Rose passed away. She
decided that by ritualistically jumping over the fish-pond she would be
able to stop anyone else in her family from leaving her. Unable to swim, this obsessive ritual nearly drowned her.

'I
don't know why I did it. The problem with OCD is it doesn't have any rules.
For me it was just that, "If I can make it to the other side then
everything would be fine".

'It
was a coy carp fish pond so it was really big and really deep. Every
time that I would try to jump across it I would go under. It was
fortunate that I had sisters and my parents were around, so people were
around to help me.'

'It wasn't really
something that was spoken about back then. I didn't know why I was doing
it. I kind took it upon myself to think there was nothing wrong with
me and everyone else had the problem, they were dirty. I would blame
everyone else.'

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This early
experience set Hayley on a path of extreme and crippling OCD. When she
gave birth she refused to hold her babies due to fear of germs.

'It
happened with all three of them. With Calum I hadn't been diagnosed
and I couldn't go into hospital equipped to tell midwives "It's not me
being a bad mum or not feeling love for my child".

Hayley (l) and sister Lauren and sitting in the sunshine as children, with the dreaded fishpond behind them

'The thought of blood all over me was too much.

'Midwives
were taken back when I refused to hold him. When my OCD got to its
worst people sometimes confused it with me not loving my children,
but it's the opposite. The fear of them getting sick is overwhelming.

'It's
really difficult to discuss with people. I have thoughts about them
being murdered and my husband throwing them over the balcony. It's
because that would be my worst case scenario. If anything ever happened
to one of my kids I wouldn't carry on living.'

Hayley, who starred on Channel 4's Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners, has now written a book, Coming Clean: Living With OCD, all about her life living with a consuming and crippling condition.

She
would obsessively clean patches of the floor to prevent any harm coming
to her children, but would then forget to pick them up from nursery as
she found this task so absorbing.

Hayley and Robin on their wedding day when she was still undiagnosed

She would wash her hands 60 times a day in neat bleach and herdenial continued until the day her husband Robin, who works as a team leader at a medical supplies company, insisted she go to the doctors to seek help.

They had both presumed that she had been suffering from post-natal depression until then.

'We were going to a family event and he rushed me out of the house, I was hitting him and I was crying.

'The
only way I can describe it is that I thought if he dragged me away from
bleaching the toilet I would get punished and something bad would
happen to the kids. I could almost see someone putting a gun to my kids'
heads. I was hysterical.'

Eventually Robin turned the car around and Hayley could get back to her ritual.

Hayley enjoying a cosy moment at Center Parcs with her husband and three children

'I went back into the bathroom, finished bleaching the toilet and I was fine.

'The following day he sat me down and said "Do you think that was normal the way you were behaving yesterday?"

'But I didn't understand. He realised this isn't right and booked me an appointment at the doctors.

'I
was very much in denial. There was a fear inside me of being stopped. I
felt so sure that if I didnt carry out these rituals that my children
would die. I was waiting for the inevitable to happen.'

Eventually Hayley, a full-time mother to three children all under the age of ten, had a course of cognitive behavioural therapy and was put on a drug called fluoxetine.

'People sometimes confuse my OCD with me not loving my children, but it's the opposite. The fear of them getting sick is overwhelming'

'It's not one of those things where you're cured overnight,' says Hayley.

'It's
taken me years and years to get to the point where I am at now. After a
while I thought I was in control and stopped taking the medication. My
body started having spasms, my legs started shaking. I remember crying
to my husband and wondering what's wrong.'

Even
after diagnosis and having taken medication for some time, the illness
continued to blight her life and nearly drove her to suicide.

'I ended up getting to point where I felt like I was a bad mum. I thought that I was mental,' she says.

'The
reason i wanted to take my own life is it got to the point where I was
cleaning for hours and hours. I was wrecking my hands washing in bleach.
I was consumed by these thoughts and felt the only control I could have
was over whether to take my own life or not.

'Looking
at kitchen knives I thought about stabbing myself but worried about the
blood splattered on the floor. I was thinking of "clean" ways I could
do it and googling how many pills I would need to take.

Enjoying a day at the beach with two of her boys (l) she wasn't keen to let Calum go on this ride on his own (r)

'It
happened after I was diagnosed. To begin with nothing seemed to change
or get better. I was at a point where I felt like I was going crazy
anyway. I was convinced my kids were going to get taken away from me.

'It
will be the first time - in the book - that some of my family members
would have heard of it. It's very much a secret illness which is why im
doing the book and the show, encouraging people that it is okay to talk
about it.'

Hayley
eventually got weaned off her medication and is now using Rescue Remedy or Kalms.

'That
might not work for everyone but I'm at a place now where that's enough
to take the edge off.

'I eventually realised OCD is just a thought and you can't let it control your life. It bullies you and blackmails you.'

And Hayley admits the OCD does creep back in.

Coming Clean: Living With OCD is out now

'Rightly or wrongly the bleach is very
much still a part of my life. I bleach my toilet all day every day
religiously. If I can't smell it in the bathroom I'll top it up
immediately. I take everything out the fridge and bleach it, too.'

But her husband keeps Hayley in check.

I'm quite lucky. When he's with me he is
quite key in seeing the signs.

'I sometimes don't realise if I'm washing my
hands several times, he'll remind me and I will then know that I need to reign it back in.

'If I panic over
something he'll say "Hayley, it's just a thought"... he's good at reassuring
and reminding me.'

And Hayley keeps an eye on her kids, too.

'My middle son won't share a drink or
utensils. I have been monitoring that. Having lived through OCD myself, I
wouldn't want him to go through that.'

Coming Clean: Living With OCD by Hayley
Leitch with Veronica Clark is published by John Blake and is out now for £7.99.

The new series of Channel 4's Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners starts in September.